There doesn't seem to be a lot of information floating around about this yet, but it looks pretty slick from the video. It is free to play, but I can't tell if it is going to be a Hearthstone-style CCG, or if it will have full trading and an economy. That's the biggest question I have at the moment.

It is a meld of Hearthstone & MtG (improving upon Hex handling of Mana/Shards/Power/Play Points), but chooses MtG style of Attacker/Blocker v. Hearthstone/Shadowverse/Etc.

Various Single Player formats like Gauntlet where you beat 7 AI in a row, & score rewards on how far you make, each progressively tougher. Good for grinding good, at least until you hit Master (every time you beat it, you "rank up" -- Silver -> Bronze -> Gold -> Diamond -> Master) where "rank up" rewards are very generous, including packs.

Forge, a single player format similar to Hearthstone Arena, where you are presented with 3 cards & you pick 1. 25X (and then your deck will be filled with necessary Power/Mana cards). The 1st 2 colors you pick then will narrow your selections down to only cards of those 2 colors. You go until you win 7 or lose 2. You add the cards you pick to your collection.

Draft, similar to MtG, though packs are presented asynchronous -- you draft from 4 packs, and then play until you win 7, or lose 3. You keep the cards you draft, like Forge. Rewards are greater, but so is entry cost.

It still in Beta, but they do 2 Set releases per year and 2 campaigns that are like mini-sets, ~20 cards. Plus Promo cards & Events.

"We offered players a Camelot. We immediately discovered players wanted to smear shit all over the walls, create giant penises out of whatever was available, rape, rob and kill their fellow players and anything else not given invulnerability while making the teabag emote over their corpses and generally be utter and complete cunts. So we dialed it back a little." ~HaemishM

i can't play eternal and elder scrolls because Dire Wolf made some questionable hires

Why were they "questionable hires"?

Design team? CS team?

"We offered players a Camelot. We immediately discovered players wanted to smear shit all over the walls, create giant penises out of whatever was available, rape, rob and kill their fellow players and anything else not given invulnerability while making the teabag emote over their corpses and generally be utter and complete cunts. So we dialed it back a little." ~HaemishM

I played this briefly a while ago and just really hated the land mechanic. So many games where you have too many lands or no lands at all. I felt pretty powerless to draw RNG moreso than hearthstone or shadowverse.

i can't play eternal and elder scrolls because Dire Wolf made some questionable hires

Why were they "questionable hires"?

Design team? CS team?

Is that really relevant?

Well you give an amorphous comment, and it just seems so vague.

"Questionable hires"?

Because of a personal animus (a beef with an individual or because they didn't hire you or they hired X)? Or because they hire wife beaters, pussy grabbers, puppy killers, etc.? In other words, like is it a reason that players should boycott DWD?

"We offered players a Camelot. We immediately discovered players wanted to smear shit all over the walls, create giant penises out of whatever was available, rape, rob and kill their fellow players and anything else not given invulnerability while making the teabag emote over their corpses and generally be utter and complete cunts. So we dialed it back a little." ~HaemishM

I played this briefly a while ago and just really hated the land mechanic. So many games where you have too many lands or no lands at all. I felt pretty powerless to draw RNG moreso than hearthstone or shadowverse.

Yeah, it, like MtG/Hex, does the card as resource/mana/power/shards/play points.

But it is mitigated a bit here as on a Redraw you are guaranteed to get 2-4 Power cards. Still, in these games, you can always get starved (or flooded), but at least you're set for first couple of turns/draws.

"We offered players a Camelot. We immediately discovered players wanted to smear shit all over the walls, create giant penises out of whatever was available, rape, rob and kill their fellow players and anything else not given invulnerability while making the teabag emote over their corpses and generally be utter and complete cunts. So we dialed it back a little." ~HaemishM

Is there an "Arena" or random deck drafting mode? When I played MtG, I always preferred virgin deck play to that of built decks. I'm not really into the Pokemon aspect of these games.

Yes, there is an multiplayer "Arena" mode.

You pick from 4 booster packs and pack is passed along after you pick a card, so you pick from a pack of 12, then 11, 10, etc., 4X to get 48 cards and build a 45 card deck (you'll use 25-30 of them, depending on how many Power card slots that you get for free -- standard is 18, +/- depending on deck composition and if you've taken some cards in the draft that provide Power, like Banners or Seats or Transmuted cards that are Power when you are <5 Max Power, but turn into a different card after you have Max Power >= 5) -- a little different than MtG where you're playing against the people you draft with -- here, you get passed picked from packs from the same person, but it's done asynchronously. You play until you win 7 or lose 3, and rewards progress up. You do get to keep the cards you draft, which means some players are just grabbing Rare/Legendary cards (a pack contains 12 cards -- 8 Common, 3 Uncommon, and 1 Rare/Legendary, with 10% chance of Rare being upgraded to a Legendary).

"We offered players a Camelot. We immediately discovered players wanted to smear shit all over the walls, create giant penises out of whatever was available, rape, rob and kill their fellow players and anything else not given invulnerability while making the teabag emote over their corpses and generally be utter and complete cunts. So we dialed it back a little." ~HaemishM

i can't play eternal and elder scrolls because Dire Wolf made some questionable hires

Why were they "questionable hires"?

Design team? CS team?

Is that really relevant?

Well you give an amorphous comment, and it just seems so vague.

"Questionable hires"?

Because of a personal animus (a beef with an individual or because they didn't hire you or they hired X)? Or because they hire wife beaters, pussy grabbers, puppy killers, etc.? In other words, like is it a reason that players should boycott DWD?

Just some folks I don't consider to be in the top 50%. I do love LSV tho.

Its good, far better than SV or HS in terms of gameplay but they are too small and the playerbase is too small and the result is new cards are really slow to come out. Also the grind as f2p to get to constructed is insane compared to SV or HS. Draft is great though and you keep the cards.

A nation consists of its laws. A nation does not consist of its situation at a given time. If an individual's morals are situational, then that individual is without morals. If a nation's laws are situational, that nation has no laws, and soon isn't a nation.-William Gibson

I tried Hex, made it through the single player content, and game was OK, but the client made my eyes bleed. And it desktop only. Hex has a bigger card pool because it's been out longer, & Eternal improves upon Hex handling of Mana/Shards/Power.

It's available on mobile -- has PC / Mac / iOS / Android, and a better client (UI) than all of these games IMV.

And while the player base on here is a fraction of Hearthstone (& is trailing Gwent, Shadowverse, MtG Online, it's steadily growing (got an infusion of new players when Hasbro/Wizards announced they were ceasing support for Magic Duels), whereas Hex is a *dying* (along with Faeria, Duelyist) game, with a shrinking & tiny player base.

Yes, none of these games are MtG. But then they don't make you click 5X+ a turn either, as they're streamlined for digital play.

Playing Hex just made me sad I wasn't playing MtG. Playing Eternal I get that I'm playing a streamlined MtG knockoff that lifted the pizzazz & polish from Hearthstone, but it's enjoyable for me. It's not perfect, there are flaws in the game that make it inferior to MtG and the card pool is still relatively small, but it's the best of these IMV.

« Last Edit: October 13, 2017, 10:09:17 AM by naum »

"We offered players a Camelot. We immediately discovered players wanted to smear shit all over the walls, create giant penises out of whatever was available, rape, rob and kill their fellow players and anything else not given invulnerability while making the teabag emote over their corpses and generally be utter and complete cunts. So we dialed it back a little." ~HaemishM

Yes, none of these games are MtG. But then they don't make you click 5X+ a turn either, as they're streamlined for digital play.

Clicking serves a purpose. Saying you want something easier and less fiddly is fine. Knocking the exact thing that mimics depth, however, is absurd. Without the clicking, you get Hearthstone. Which is objectively garbage.

Playing Hex just made me sad I wasn't playing MtG. Playing Eternal I get that I'm playing a streamlined MtG knockoff that lifted the pizzazz & polish from Hearthstone, but it's enjoyable for me. It's not perfect, there are flaws in the game that make it inferior to MtG and the card pool is still relatively small, but it's the best of these IMV.

This I agree with. Playing Hex makes me miss Magic, though they could fix that pretty easily. As for Eternal, the card pool will never, ever be as good as Magic - nor will the mechanics. They're not equipped to produce at that level.

Yes, none of these games are MtG. But then they don't make you click 5X+ a turn either, as they're streamlined for digital play.

Clicking serves a purpose. Saying you want something easier and less fiddly is fine. Knocking the exact thing that mimics depth, however, is absurd. Without the clicking, you get Hearthstone. Which is objectively garbage.

Yes, but the challenge for a digital MtG client is to incorporate this in best way you can to make UI decent. They took a (partial) stab at this with Magic Duels (& they still continue to truck along with the awful Magic Online that is subpar even by 2007 standards) client & will still retain that monster when MtG Arena launches, which will only be for new set(s)). Eternal has *Fast Spells* so you can interact on opponent's turn (besides unit blocking), but it's streamlined (and critics will lambast that it's a *tell* when game pauses, you know opponent is holding a *Fast Spell* of some sort though it may not be relevant to the context of gameplay at that turn juncture).

Eternal also does away with the hero power features of Hearthstone (& Hex too).

I like the lore of gunslingers, outlaws, dinosaurs, dragons, mystics, shadow, etc. in Eternal whereas Hex just struck me as a washed out MtG, in terms of lore.

But the striking contrast is client -- Hex doesn't even offer mobile client (though it is multiplatform on desktop) and the client looks like ass -- my eyes hurt after playing Hex for an hour or more. We can debate about intricacies and deepness of strategy in gameplay, but polish & pizzazz in the visual/audio presentation is just as impactful (I know, this is coming from someone whose favorite strategy game is Dominions 3/4/5 :D). It's why Hearthstone is the colossal beast (well, also because of Blizzard past dominance & Warcraft lore) in this genre. But even Hearthstone client (and game platform) starting to show its age compared to Eternal, Shadowverse, Gwent (which I've not played but now might be #2 after Hearthstone), that offer more features and gameplay modes.

« Last Edit: October 13, 2017, 11:11:31 AM by naum »

"We offered players a Camelot. We immediately discovered players wanted to smear shit all over the walls, create giant penises out of whatever was available, rape, rob and kill their fellow players and anything else not given invulnerability while making the teabag emote over their corpses and generally be utter and complete cunts. So we dialed it back a little." ~HaemishM

I don't see your problem with Hex's client (other than lack of mobile). It plays and looks fine to me, although I would like a game with LESS flashy shit that just ran better. Your comment that you played Hex's single player with no mention of multiplayer says that maybe we're looking for different things in TCGs.

I don't see your problem with Hex's client (other than lack of mobile). It plays and looks fine to me, although I would like a game with LESS flashy shit that just ran better. Your comment that you played Hex's single player with no mention of multiplayer says that maybe we're looking for different things in TCGs.

Nah, just didn't make it past single player (especially coming late to a game where multiple sets been released and you have no cards) to do MP. Played through opening campaign & some of the single player nodes (or whatever they call them, it been a few months). Single player in these games is just to get you up and running (and actually may be a hindrance for experienced players that have to trog through silly opening campaigns. Still, Eternal has a Gauntlet mode that players use to grind gold (and even see how fast they can reel off 7 wins).

In Hex, had difficulty reading the text on the cards (maybe it way my system rendered fonts), & the UI so washed out, had to really focus to see what was going on during gameplay. Even in card collection / deck screens, had to squint to see clearly & experimented with a bunch of different display settings to no avail.

Granted, I am cursed with poor eyesight, so maybe not even noticeable for many players, but my eyes *hurt* after playing Hex for more than an hour or so.

"We offered players a Camelot. We immediately discovered players wanted to smear shit all over the walls, create giant penises out of whatever was available, rape, rob and kill their fellow players and anything else not given invulnerability while making the teabag emote over their corpses and generally be utter and complete cunts. So we dialed it back a little." ~HaemishM

I have shit eyesight also, this is very much a YMMV thing though. Not sure why you'd try to read the text on any cards without zooming in. But anyway, yeah, judging it based on the single player is ridiculous. The single player shouldn't even exist.

"My great-grandfather did not travel across four thousand miles of the Atlantic Ocean to see this nation overrun by immigrants. He did it because he killed a man back in Ireland. That's the rumor."-Stephen Colbert

It certainly helps that every set they've released since Return to Ravnica has been hot garbage and even that (and Innistrad) were exceptions ot the rule since Scars of Mirrodin set their trajectory to "further than the bottom of a dumpster."

It certainly helps that every set they've released since Return to Ravnica has been hot garbage and even that (and Innistrad) were exceptions ot the rule since Scars of Mirrodin set their trajectory to "further than the bottom of a dumpster."

Is Ixalan included in that *garbage* list?

"We offered players a Camelot. We immediately discovered players wanted to smear shit all over the walls, create giant penises out of whatever was available, rape, rob and kill their fellow players and anything else not given invulnerability while making the teabag emote over their corpses and generally be utter and complete cunts. So we dialed it back a little." ~HaemishM

I don't know -- following some Eternal streamers that also still active with Magic rekindled my desire (seeing Twitter updates on Ixalan release) to play MtG so I ordered a couple of Ixalan bundle boxes with hopes I can coax family & nearby IRL friends to do this League thing.

Haven't purchased *physical* MtG cards in over 15 years. And I think it's been 10 years since last MtG Online gameplay (though I did, a few months back, play a bit of Magic Duels on iPad).

"We offered players a Camelot. We immediately discovered players wanted to smear shit all over the walls, create giant penises out of whatever was available, rape, rob and kill their fellow players and anything else not given invulnerability while making the teabag emote over their corpses and generally be utter and complete cunts. So we dialed it back a little." ~HaemishM